The invention concerns a tappet particularly for a pump or a compressor, said tappet comprising a tube-like housing comprising two flats which are indented from an outer shell of the housing near a drive-side annular face of the housing (2) and lie diametrically opposite each other, a pin carrying a roller being mounted in said flats, an inner shell of the housing being penetrated axially below the roller by a separate bridge member, a lower face of said bridge member acting near a driven-side annular face of said housing as a support for a tappet follower member, and said bridge member being fixed against rotation about an axial line of the housing.
A tappet of the pre-cited type, in this case for acting upon a pump piston of a high pressure fuel pump of an internal combustion engine, is disclosed in DE 10 2010 022 318 A1. The disk-like bridge member disclosed herein is relatively thin and therefore can no longer cope with the high loads occurring in modern high pressure fuel pumps. It would, however, not be possible to mount a clearly thicker disk-like bridge member and the mass of the tappet would be impermissibly increased. In addition, the bridge member that almost completely fills the tappet in radial direction permits only a poor through-flow of a medium such as for instance diesel oil if the tappet is used in a high pressure fuel pump of a quality controlled internal combustion engine. Moreover, an anti-rotation feature for the bridge member about the axis of the tappet through a one-sided engagement of a lug through a clearance of the housing is only inadequate.